Furniture Sustainability Standard - Approved by ANSI and Released for Distribution

January 04, 2011 |

Grand Rapids, MI - BIFMA International recently announced formal American National Standards Institute (ANSI) approval and release of the ANSI/BIFMA e3-2010 Furniture Sustainability Standard. The e3 standard represents a structured methodology to evaluate the "sustainable" attributes of furniture products and constitutes the technical criteria of the level product certification program.

Modeled after the LEED rating system, the e3 standard includes six prerequisites and numerous optional credit criteria. As a product is determined to conform to the various optional criteria, points are accumulated toward an ultimate score and corresponding conformance tier. A minimum of 32 points (of the 90 total available) must be achieved in order to reach the first conformance threshold.

This standard is the result of an extraordinary amount of development work on the part of numerous stakeholders representing a broad cross section of disciplines, backgrounds and perspectives.

BIFMA is a not-for-profit organization who’s mission includes the development of voluntary product and industry standards that support safe, healthy and sustainable environments; publishing of key industry statistics; advocating for legislation and government regulation that have a direct impact on the health of the industry; and facilitating meaningful dialog and education to support our core services and the industry.

The report, “Spending Through the Roof,” says that apartment building owners pay an average of $3,400 a year to replace heat lost through the roof. In taller buildings, the cost can be more than $20,000 a year. Illustration: Urban Green Council